


the love we shared was for another time

by queenofthestarrrs



Category: X-Men (Movies), X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014) - Fandom
Genre: (that's it that's the story), Charles Always Says the Absolute Worst Thing He Could Possibly Say, M/M, Poor Charles, Poor Erik, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-05
Updated: 2014-07-05
Packaged: 2018-02-07 14:14:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1902057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenofthestarrrs/pseuds/queenofthestarrrs
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Can I come home, Charles?"<br/>"No."</p><p>We do what we have to because there is no other option.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the love we shared was for another time

**Author's Note:**

> The title comes from the song called "When I Go" by Slow Club which is perfect song for Charles/Erik, and it should be included on every single fanmix.

“So this is where you’ve been hiding?” Charles asked as he struggled to wheel himself up off the cobblestone next to the half rusted patio table. Two cups, one half filled with black coffee and the other brimming with steaming tea, were perched next to a battered copy of The Once and Future King that was missing half of its cover. A small flower pot with a large crack running down the side was filled with a thriving little bunch of tulips. “When you asked me to meet with you, Erik, I had expected somewhere a bit more discreet.” 

“It’s good to see you too, old friend.” Erik paused to remove his aviator sunglasses and hat. He placed them in a careful arrangement on top of the book and folded his arms across his chest. It was a near perfect day. An early morning sun streamed through the few olive trees planted near the cafe. It’s light was bright and pleasantly warm as it hit the top of Charles’ head and shoulders. A slight breeze picked up the scent of fresh brewed coffee and pastries. Young women with dark hair chatting with each other in rapid fire Hebrew and old men pouring over novels in English, French, and German sat at equally dilapidated tables. Flowers bloomed in window baskets and on apartment porches. It was a pleasant change from than the basement of the Pentagon or the panicked streets of Paris, the last places that had seen each other. “Welcome to Jerusalem.” 

“For a wanted terrorist on the run from law and order, you look much better than I had expected you would, my friend.” Charles had commented as he settled himself into place and set the lock on his wheelchair.

Erik smiled in spite of himself, and Charles could damn him to hell for all eternity for that. Erik indeed still looked quite well, indeed. There were a few more wrinkles around the corners of his eyes, and a few streaks of gray gathered around his temples. Though, that had just served to make him look much more dignified than elderly. Lean muscles were still visible underneath his thin button up shirt. His steel eyes still burned brightly behind heavy lashes. His shoulders were as broad as ever.

Gone, however, was the impassioned freedom fighter he had styled himself as over a decade ago. In his place stood a veteran of an invisible war, unweathered by the sands of time nor the confines of a plastic prison. 

“For a former drug addict and borderline bohemian, I must say this new look rather suits you.” Erik said as he reached for his cup. 

Charles couldn’t deny that he had cleaned up his act at Hank’s insistence. Weeks were spent cleaning the mansion, and by extension, himself, from head to toe. While they scoured the mansion, tossing the rubbish out, packing what they couldn’t bare to part with, he slowly started picking himself out of the funk he found himself. His face was once again cleanly shaven. His hair neatly cut and combed. He had abandoned his torn pairs of bell bottoms and silken robes for pressed khakis and long sleeved shirts that were both fashionable and functional. He kept his brightly printed shirts that were always buttoned at his wrist no matter the weather, making sure that no one would ever see the dark bruises in the crooks of his arms.

“Yes,” he shrugged, taking a sip of his own drink. Erik had ordered it just as he always liked it, no milk and almost sickeningly sweet. “Well, parents don’t exactly trust you with their children’s education when you look like you haven’t taken a proper shower in years. It’s rather bad for business.” 

Erik’s eyebrow shot up to his hairline. He readjusted his arms, muscles flexing and shifting under light cloth. If Erik noticed Charles staring, he never said anything about it. 

“You look surprised, Erik.”

“Does this mean,” he placed his cup back down on the table, “that you’ve reopened your school for good now?”

Charles narrowed his eyes and set the cup down. “How do you know about my school, Erik? Who told you about it?”

Erik shrugged noncommittally. “They gave me old papers, half of books. They were always censured. Pages were torn out. Words were blacked out with markers. But they couldn’t hide everything for me. Your school was mentioned in an article about the top ten unique things in New York. A school full of mutants is an oddity.”

Charles narrowed his eyes even further until he was practically squinting in Erik’s general direction. 

“You will stay away from that school, Erik.” He said evenly, as if he was giving instructions to one of the younger students. “You are not to come near a single one of them. You are not to speak a single word to them, touch a single hair on their heads.”

Erik rubbed his temples. A predator like grin spread across his face. “Come now, Charles. A mild pain in the back of my head is the worst you can do these days? Why, years ago-”

As soon as the words left his mouth, Erik was doubled over in pain. His hands had gone to cradle his head. A low animal-like moan practically escaped from his mouth. One of the waiters, a middle aged man with a sizable gut and olive skin, huddled over his side, asking him rapid fire questions in a language Charles assumed was Hebrew. Erik waved him off, repeating the same word, “k'ev rֹsh!” over and over again. A few of the old men put their books down to watch him rock back and forth in agony. 

“You English, yes?” One of the old man had asked him in a raspy voice. His accent seemed German, and Charles was willing to bet if he looked at the man’s forearm, he’d see a row of numbers tattooed neatly. 

“I am.”

“Your friend,” the man continued. “What is wrong?”

“Headaches,” Charles replied, smiling brightly. “He gets them frequently. It should be over soon. There’s really no need to worry, my good man.”

The old man nodded very slowly and turned back to his book. The waiter had finally given up attempting to console Erik or find him medical attention or whatever it was he was trying to accomplish. He retreated back into the cafe with surprising speed. Slowly, Charles placed two of his fingers on his temple. Erik immediately unfurled, unwound. His legs stretched out underneath the table. The tips of polished Oxfords barely touching the edge of his wheel. His arms hung at his side, a row of number visible against creamy flesh under sheer fabric. 

“I didn’t think you had that in you. Charles, that was impressive,” huffed Erik as he wiped a stray bead of sweat from his forehead. “It hurt like a bitch, but I am impressed nonetheless. Perhaps I should have brought my helmet with me.”

“That helmet makes you look like a fool.” Charles shook his head. “I never meant to hurt you like that, Erik. I may just have some residual anger left over from the fiasco in Washington.” 

Erik traced twin pink spots on his neck. “If anyone should be upset, it should be me. I was the one who was nearly shot to death by your sister.” 

Charles gripped his teacup until his knuckles turned as white as the porcelain. “You threatened to murder over twenty people on national television. You were lucky Raven, Hank, and I were gracious enough to let you walk away from that with your life. You’re not in a position to complain.” 

“I was doing what I had to do in order to protect our people,” deadpanned Erik as his dropped from his neck on to the table. The cups jumped, leaving ripples sloshing around their insides. “They were deplorable people. They deserved exactly what I was gonna do to them. They dug their own graves.

Charles narrowed his eyes. “That doesn’t mean you murder them. That would have made you no better than they are. That would have made us all the enemy. I thought you finally would have learned that after all these years.”

Smatterings of Hebrew and Arabic were shouted in the distance. The sun had risen higher in the sky. It was beating down harshly. Charles expected a bright red burn across his cheeks the next morning. Erik smirked. 

“Why are you making that face?” Charles asked as his hand moved to shield his eyes from brightness he was unaccustomed to. 

“Off of Hank’s special brand of dope and back on the high horse again, Charles? That may be a record time..”

Charles slammed his hand down onto the table. Erik’s cup of coffee, or what was left of it, crashed over and spilled onto the sidewalk, a brown puddle in the dust. A few of the young women looked over and snickered but didn’t move. The same waiter was tucked away in the doorway, observing the strange men yelling at each other in the street. Erik fixed his eyes on the stain with a neutral expression, lips in a tight line.

“What did you ask me to come here for, Erik? I’d really like to know before I get on the next flight back to New York. Was it to insult me?! To prove you have the upper hand?! ” He seethed through his teeth. 

“No,” Erik looked taken aback and almost remorseful. “Of course not, Charles. I never meant to do any of that.”

Charles exhaled in measured little breaths. “Then why am I here? Why am I sitting with you of all people outside of a cafe in a foreign country I didn’t even tell anyone I was going to?”

Erik’s eyes reverted back to the stain on the ground. It was already starting to fade under the hot sun. “I want to go with you, Charles.” 

Charles stopped his whirlwind in its tracks. His hands settled in his lap. His eyes grew wide. His mouth had snapped closed. He could only stop and stare as Erik went on.

“I want to go back with you, Charles. I miss you. I’ve missed you dearly since we parted ways on that beach years ago. Your absence left a large hole in my life, a hole shaped like a conscience. We’re no longer young men. And I’m tired. I’m so, so tired, more tired than I have ever been in my entire life. I want somewhere to go, somewhere I don’t have run.” Erik reached out a hand and faintly brushed the tips of Charles’ fingers. Steel gray eyes bore into blue ones. “Can I come home?”

“No,” was the quiet response.

Erik looked shocked, but Charles just shook his head. He looped his hands into Erik’s, savoring their dry warmth. He ran his thumbs over bruised knuckles.

“I’m sorry,” he muttered, “but you are a criminal, Erik, as much as we both wish that wasn’t true. But it is. And you heard what I said earlier. I have students. I have young people, children, who came to me the exact same way you did. They were scared and lost and alone just like you were. And I promised to protect them. I promised I would never let the kind of things that happened to Sean and Angel and Emma and Azael happen to them. They trust me with their lives, and I cannot, I will not expose them to the kind of risks you are made of.”

Charles continued to rub little patterns on the back of Erik’s hand. “I love you. You know that I do. You have to know that I do. I loved you even when I hated you, but things have changed.”

They sit in silence for a few minutes as the city goes about its business, both holy and mundane, all around them. School children run to class, tripping over the cobblestone. Young mothers lead small children by the hand. Old couples stroll down the street, basking in the freedom they have hardly known. Nuns and Orthodox rabbis scurried after each other down the old streets. Vendors begin to set up their street stands. Lost looking tourists debate whether they should or shouldn’t ask for directions. 

“Perhaps people like us are meant to be happy like that,” said Charles quietly. “Perhaps when we chose this life, perhaps we were given a chance to have better.”

“What is that?” Erik responded almost angrily. “What is better than the chance to love and to be loved in return?”

“You’ll always be loved, Erik. Even at your worst, you will be loved. I can promise you that. But we were given the chance to do something incredible. A chance to change the world, to mold it into something of our own design, to march bravely into the history books. All in all, I see what’s happened to us as a small sacrifice.”

It was Erik’s turn to shake his head. He stood to his full height, regaining his composure. He reached into his pocket and slipped a small scrap of paper across the table. It was crumpled and torn around the edges, but its writing was as neat as Charles remembered it to be. 

“The address of the place I’ve been staying,” he explained. “Ask the landlord to see Max Eisenhardt. I’d very much like to see you before you head back to Westchester, and I head out to wherever I’m going next.”

“Yes, yes of course. I’ll drop by on Monday,” whispered Charles before he pocketed the address. “I’m terribly sorry, my love.”

“As am I, old friend, as am I.”


End file.
